


Modern Gods

by crystalkardashians



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, F/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-26
Updated: 2016-12-26
Packaged: 2018-09-12 09:17:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9065542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystalkardashians/pseuds/crystalkardashians
Summary: They are the ghosts of a time long forgotten, because immortality is kind to no one.





	1. Poseidon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Daddy, why is he crying?"
> 
> "Oh that poor fisherman, back in his day, the water was clear as glass. But if you dropped a penny in that water today, you'd lose it forever."
> 
> "But daddy, I don't want him to be sad."
> 
> "Son, it'll take all of humanity's efforts to bring cheer to those old eyes again. The damage has been done, and it is too great."

The landlord leads me into the apartment. It is brightly lit in the Miami sunshine, with curtains pulled back, shiny tabletops and a fresh, airy feel to everything.

"I hope you like it, we've just cleaned the place up."

"It's perfect." I reply.

Walking into the bedroom, I notice that there are several beautifully painted seashells stuck on the wall above the bed. The landlord walks in after me and catches me staring at them.

"Ah, the previous tenant put those up and I couldn't get them off the wall. Some really strong glue he must have used."

"Really?" I ask. "He must have really liked ocean-y stuff huh?"

"He was a strange one, that boy, always brooding. Sadly, he discovered that he had a terminal disease and he's gone back home."

"Oh... I hope he's alright."

"Nah, he'll be fine." the landlord replies with a sigh. "And if everything's good, I'll leave you here to unpack. Call me if you need anything boy."

And with that, he shuffles out of the room and I hear the front door shut with a click.

Placing my backpack on the living room couch, I pace around the place and explore, opening kitchen drawers, fiddling with appliances, channel surfing to see what's on tv. Propping my feet on the coffee table, I lean back and out of the corner of my vision, I spot an old desk that somehow seems so out of place. My curiosity gets the better of me so I go over to check it out, and there on the desktop, lies a book. It's the usual type of notebook you'd see middle schoolers or high school students carry around, with a green cover and pages bound by rings. I pick it up and flip it open to a random page.

"Help me, I can feel the ocean dying, it poisons me, I can feel it in my veins. What have the mortals done to me? They used to fear me and worship me, I gave those who I favoured calm seas and terrifying storms to those I hated.

It's no use. I miss the old times, even with all the constant bickering and petty fights. I remember how I built the walls of Troy, that backbreaking work under the heat of the sun, curse you Apollo my nephew. And how that horrible niece of mine stole the patronship of Athens right from under my nose. I hope she's suffering just like I am now.

I wonder how many of them are alive, or are they all gone too? Am I next?"

Dropping the book back onto the desktop, I momentarily stop to wonder whether this guy was nuts or not? How can someone feel the ocean dying? Yeah I get it, with pollution and all that stuff the hippie treehuggers back in college wouldn't shut up about. But what was that crap about building the walls of Troy? I hurriedly start flipping through the book to find the page I was at earlier, it was just too intriguing to stop reading.

"What have I been reduced to? Back then, I used to spend my nights surrounded by beautiful women, safe and secure in my knowledge that I was king of all the oceans. And now I just spend my nights with my head in that horrid toilet, retching up thick black poisons, the oily and bitter decomposing remains of myself.

I used to think that someone was poisoning me, that maybe Demeter was turning all my food bad as revenge for what I did to her eons ago.

I dread mirrors, what a horrible mortal invention. Gone is the strong, black bearded man I used to know, and in his place stands an emaciated ghost of his former glory. My black hair is now falling off in clumps and my beautiful sea green eyes have lost their light. My skin is waxy and drawn tight over my bones. I hate myself, maybe immortality was a punishment after all."

"Dafuq?" I think to myself. Why is this guy writing as though he was some sort of poetic version of God, immortality and what not. Also, who was Demeter? I kinda remembered that name from somewhere but... what?

"Gahhh, even my teeth are falling out, I guess this is really the end for me. When I walk along the beaches, all I see is sadness and death. Honestly, Hades must be happy with the situation these days.

These mortals don't know what they're doing to me, they're killing me but I can't even strike them down. With every dead fish that washes up on shore, it's once beautiful scales slick with oil, a part of me dies with it."

The rest of the page is blurred with blotches of smudged words. as though the writer had broken down in tears after writing this entry, his sorrow soaking into the paper. I examine the writing closely, it's a neat cursive written in a strange bronzy coloured ink. Not only was this guy strange, he used strange pens too, I think to myself with a mental laugh.

Flipping the page over, I realize that this one is blank, and so is the next page, and the next. My heart rises in a panic, I badly wanted to know how his story continued. After flipping past a dozen or so blank pages, there is finally one that isn't of a plain lined surface.

"I've made a decision, I'm going home. Maybe I'll rest in peace knowing that when I finally give out and crumble to ash, they won't be scattered to the wind in this mortal city. Maybe then, they'll remember who I am..."


	2. Athena

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "And when you need her the most, there she will be, pushing a spear stained by the blood of many before you and a shield feared by all gods and mortals into your hands. She is your goddess and you are her hero."

I wake up to find her curled up next to me, long straight lashes against her cheeks, soft dark brown bangs falling across her brow. Dressed in a white t-shirt and cotton shorts, I have never seen her looking so peaceful before. Gone is the intense, calculating stare and the coiled up energy in her muscles. Her mind that always seems to be on the move is finally at rest, like the traveler who has finally found himself a warm bed and a roof over his head.

I think of the time I first spotted her in the back of an architecture lecture, right hand madly scribbling notes while she drummed the fingers of the left against the table top. She then leaned back and I caught a glimpse of what she was wearing, skinny jeans, a tight tank top and red suspenders. Oh how I fantasized about slipping those suspenders off her delicate but strong shoulders.

We had our first kiss under a flickering neon light on a rainy night. The world of city lights, cars splashing through puddles and passers by turning to stare melted into oblivion as our lips touched. A thousand words, each describing emotions I could never have described pressed against my ribcage, threatening to burst forth like arrows and impale my beautiful lover. But I could never let that happen, I loved her, strangely, like I had never loved another before. And in that moment of smudged lipstick, my black mixing with her red and the loud shout of "LOOK AT THOSE DYKES!" coming from across the street, I lost myself to a goddess.

I muse about the times we made love, but no, not in that sense. She had always backed away from me the moment I got to undoing the zipper of her jeans or the buckle of her belt, with a proud but sad expression. We made love with her teeth grazing my lower lip while my nails raked across her skin. It was a mental connection she called it. You know, like "brain sex", she added with a light laugh. I nodded, I had never experienced this feeling before, but I understood it, and I felt it. It made me want to write scribble our names in a cloud of hearts all over my notebooks. "Julia <3 Ally". It was perfect, I loved Ally.

I remember how she had slipped that mug of warm tea into my shaking hands. How my father had pushed me out of the front door, yelling stuff that went along the lines that God will never love a homosexual. How he had slammed the door and left me weeping and alone on the streets on New York City. I had run off to her place, drowning in my sorrow, and she had kissed my tears away, each touch of her love replacing my sadness with hope.

"God does not hate on anyone without good reason, and being queer isn't one of those good reasons." she had said. And I believed her although I had never really believed in gods anyway.

"I love you Ally."

Swinging my legs over the bed, I padded silently out of the bedroom and into the kitchen. There was a pot of black coffee sitting in the coffee machine, she must have had woken up earlier and made it, and then probably went back to sleep before it was finished.

Running my hand along the dirt free countertop, I looked around her apartment. At the stuffed bookshelf, the pile of architecture drawings on the desk, all bleached of colour in the light of the dawn. I thought about the time I had put up fake cobwebs around the place last Halloween and how she had jumped back in fear and shrieked loudly upon entering.

"I hate spiders!"

"Hmmmm, I guess I successfully scared you then." I giggled and hugged her, trying not to wonder about the sudden look of sadness that flashed across her features.

I had also once bought her an imitation Versace medallion necklace from a flea market, you know the ones with the face of medusa on it. I put it around her neck as she gingerly fingered it. "I love it, it's so beautiful." she had whispered with eyes of deep regret. But I doubt she even cared about the fact that it was a fake. Ally just didn't care about certain things.

Walking back to the bedroom, I stood and faced the bed for a moment before getting back in. The sun was barely rising and I thought I could still catch a few hours of sleep. Sitting cross legged next to her, I admired the intricately woven rope bracelets on her wrist, there were many more scattered across her vanity, she had made them all herself.

Allowing my eyes to roam across her sleeping form, I caught sight of a long cut running along the crook of her arm. As I took a closer look, I noted that not only wasn't it completely healed yet, the coagulating blood didn't even have a hint of red in it, it was gold. Brushing my finger gently across the broken skin, I felt my heart stop as I wondered about my lover. About all the invisible secrets weighing themselves upon her shoulders, secrets visible only to me. She was a girl with gold running through her veins. Turning around and backing away, I knocked a bottle of nail polish off the bedside table. As it hit the ground with a loud bang, she stirred and opened one of those lovely grey eyes.

"Good morning Julia." she said, blinking the hazy film of sleep out of those ancient eyes.


	3. Aphrodite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "If a man sleeps with many people, he's a stud.  
> But if a woman sleeps with many people, she's a whore.  
> So say what you want about her, because she'll leave you swallowing pills the same way she'll swallow your heart."

She squinted as the bright Californian sunlight made its way through the glass panes in front of her and made it hard to see anything on her laptop screen. When Vogue offered her the job, she was overjoyed, she had thought that she would be able to bring beauty to world again, like she had eons ago, in a completely different world of course. But nevertheless the two worlds operated on the same tangent, where beauty was something to be idolized, objectified, something to die for.

Her cursor moves onscreen over commands as she edits photo after photo of people that somehow blend into one other. Kanye, Lorde, Ariana Grande, even Oprah. They're just names to her, a smoother complexion here, a thigh gap there. And in these moments of enlarging biceps on men and giving women smaller waists, she instinctively yearns to grab her wrist or hold a hand to her chest. To feel the flutter of her pulse or the thumping of her heart acknowledging that she is still alive is a moment of great relief, because she knows beauty doesn't exist in this world anymore. It exists only on paper, the easily moulded minds of mortals, and on her computer screen of course.

She huffs and closes the lid of her laptop, gently tracing a delicate fingertip over that iconic logo, the minimalistic drawing of an apple that someone had taken a bite out of. Sometimes, she wonders whether it's crude irony, because she feels like time has taken a bite out of her soul, a very large bite indeed. Hooking a finger through the handle of the lipstick stained mug next to the laptop on the desk, she walks out of the office and into the kitchen, past the white walls, and bulletin board with photos haphazardly pinned all over it. Those were the photos of her lovers, they were men, women, and everyone in between, she had let them swallow her heart as she bit their lips and ran her hands over their necks. Sometimes, she had only one love, but on other occasions, she would find herself falling for more than one person. The old world didn't really have a word for it, but this world does: polyamory. And painfully enough, it is often confused with adultery. A chuckle escapes from her lips as she remembered a sentence Zeus had often quoted, "monogamy is not for the gods". He would say it with his eyes closed and index finger pointing up, whilst Hera glared at him so harshly, it was surprising that her eyeballs didn't fall out.

But she wasn't like the other gods, back then, she had loved both Hephaestus and Ares very much and she often wished that they would stop bickering and fighting over her affection and attention. But they probably didn't understand, the same way the other male gods could not comprehend how the goddess of love and beauty could have fallen for an ugly, disabled god.

But some of her most beautiful memories were from the times she had spent in her husband's forge, admiring the amber flames that flickered as he smiled and made delicate accessories for her. And while the other gods had complained of her overbearing husband keeping her home with him, she had fallen in love with him in those moments, with his sooty smile and attempts to make her laugh with his crazy puns.

With her lover, it had been a whole different side of love. It was like the adrenaline of getting onto a roller coaster and seeing how far away you are from the ground. He was the god of war and she had experienced a wholly different type of fire with him, so unlike the homely flames of the forge. All is fair in love and war, and you wonder why the good girls always fall for the baddest boys.

As she brushes her fingers over the bulletin board, a few loosely placed photos of children flutter to the ground, photos that bring a new sort of ache and longing into her heart. In the times after her once grand temples fell into ruin and humanity had seemingly forgotten about her, she had showered her neverending love on the sad, lonely, and vulnerable. Orphaned children, patients with terminal illnesses, the elderly who had been abandoned in nursing homes. But many a time, she has encountered teenage mothers handing over their babies to older married couples, and that just lights up her day a little. However, she would never dare to raise a mortal child, she could never bear to watch them die of ailments, old age, or fatal accidents that would never bother her. Her biggest fear was letting go, and being immortal, you'd think she'd have learnt how to let go and move on.

Deciding that she should really get out of the house and go for a walk instead of brooding over what is now history, she throws on a cardigan and steps out of her apartment. With each clack of her heels on the concrete sidewalks of West Hollywood, she feels a little of her old self returning, as though it is seeping through the soles of her feet and back into her soul. A gust of wind ruffles and fans out her blonde curls as she walks beneath a pride flag that billows proudly in the wind. Reaching out towards it, her fingers graze the edge of the flag as she smiles to herself, because while this world has yet to understand that beauty is not just something that is skin deep, they are perhaps on their way to finding out that love is to be cherished in all its various forms, because it is one of the most beautiful things in this world of dashed hopes and burning dreams.


	4. Hera

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Wedding bands and flowers. White veils and tiered cakes.   
> Tell me, what does the union of two people define?  
> Henna covered hands and silver bangles. Red paper cutouts and steaming tea.  
> Tell me, are these people bound by love, or by something else?"

These days, I barely sleep anymore. You'd think that after eons of waking and falling asleep, day after day, that I would have mastered the art of living. But instead I feel like I'm slowly losing touch of it. It is slipping out of my weakly grasping hands like grams of fine white sand.

When I walk on the line between waking and unconsciousness, I see the tear stained faces of young brides moulding with the sickening neon lights of a Las Vegas church, images bleeding into one other, images that make me question everything I have lived for. You see, I have always done what I could for these people. Consoled the ones who sobbed quietly under the cover of night as their spouses cheated on them. And there were some who didn't want to get married yet, but they had no choice. So there I was, absorbing their salty tears of distraught and fear into my essence, feeling it slowly poison my soul like a cocktail of arsenic and lead.

It is nearly 3am and the search for sleep is fruitless, so I get out of bed and suck in a breath of cool air-conditioned air.   
"Damn where's my phone?" I mutter as my hands rummage through my handbag, catching on tangled earphones and other odds and ends. Huffing with impatience, I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear and stomp over to the bed, throwing the heavy comforter off, I find my phone at the foot of my bed. The screen lights up moments later with Facebook and Instagram notifications. More likes and follows? Hmm, I like that, that's the life of a wedding photographer for you. I take photos of people on their "big day" and upload a select few on the web for promotional purposes, a far cry from who I used to be eons ago.

I remember it like it was yesterday, sitting next to him with three golden apples in my lap. I had smiled till my cheeks hurt, but dang at least they didn't have cameras and smartphones then. And in that moment of blissful joy mixed in with the uncertain sour taste of fear and regret, I became who I am, I had become what would define my very being. And hell yes, I regret that decision till this very day. I could have become the goddess of independent women or the goddess of feminism, as controversial as it is. But I had to take marriage instead, and with that came all of its soul crushing pain. I'm pretty sure that's why people use wedding rings as the symbolism of marriage, it's a metaphorical handcuff.

Unlocking my iPhone with a soft click, I open Instagram and start scrolling through my notifications. 107 likes on my latest photo? Hmm I guess standing under the hot sun and holding my camera in awkward positions to get the best photos was worth it all. Rolling over in bed, I lose myself in the rectangle of white light held squarely in the palm of my hands.

The hours pass in what feels like seconds and soon light starts pouring in through the thick hotel curtains. I stand up and stretch, running my fingers through the mass of dark curly hair that has draped itself around my neck like a scarf. Time to get ready for another day, but first, shower, get dressed and grab something to eat. Before long, there I am, squinting under the harsh Caribbean sunlight as the happy couple beams brightly through the lens of my camera. They can't help but remind me of the day I left him forever, walking away from the only life I had known. I just couldn't bear the thought of finding him in our marital bed with another woman or man. And so with the support of a couple of other fellow Olympians, I had dropped my ring into Hestia's fire, where it had melted like the invisible shackles that held me in place for so long. I was finally free, nothing I had experienced in my long life had ever felt so good. With the euphoria and adrenaline rushing through my system, I had taken my first steps onto mortal soil, knowing that nothing would ever make me return to a situation like that.

But of course, I've had my slip ups. Over the course of the next few centuries, I would leave countless men and in recent decades, women at the altar. I fed off their hope the same way Aphrodite swallows hearts, running away with regret eating at my core as mud and grime stained the pure whiteness of my dress. Those dresses were as tainted as I am, and now I can't help but wonder what marrying one of those mortals would have been like. They live short, insignificant lives, making up seemingly beautiful and wonderful stories to feel like they're part of something bigger. Maybe that's why they invented social media, I chuckle as I think of all the people who have liked my photos, and wonder what the world looks like through their eyes. Every moment must seem so quick and precious to them, a direct contradiction to the dullness and monotony of my life. I sigh softly as my focus returns to the happy couple staring at me through the lens and click away at my camera, each flash resonating with my now slowing heartbeat. When everything starts feeling unreal to me, the clockwork like thumping in my chest is the only reminder of how long my time has been, and it's a reliable method too.

 

Clutching my cardigan to my chest, I stand in line at an airport to check in for my flight back home. I'm drowning in my boredom so instead of people watching, I turn my eyes onto my plane ticket and start reading the uniform black print on it.

Name: Ms Harriet June Jameson  
Seat No.: F-25  
Departure: Puerto Rico  
Arrival: San Francisco  
Class: Economy

My vision goes out of focus and the next few lines mesh together in a blur of black letters. Maybe the mortal life isn't so bad afterall, it makes me feel so insignificant, just one person amidst thousands in this bustling airport. My glory days of being Hera, Queen of the Gods are over. I'm tired of being feared, tired of everyone laughing at me behind my back, tired of having so much power that in the darkest hours of the night I start to fear myself. I feel the back of my neck tingle, as thought someone is staring hard at me. Turning around, I catch sight of a man in a pilot's uniform looking in my direction. His hat shades his face but his bright blue eyes are electric. I turn back towards the check-in counters and nudge my carry on with the toe of my red converse sneaker.

"It's time to move on, time to live." I whisper.


End file.
